This is the post I was writing the weekend of the Islamic terror attack at Bondi beach. I wasn’t going to post it, it seemed spookily coincidental, but I think I must. The writing title: "If we can’t have a common God or a National identity, we’d better come up with something else before we kill each other"
Once upon a time people could agree on a handful of subjects, what was valued in our community, commonly held facts, or simply agree to disagree. Yet today, life in the western world is less tolerant than in any other time in recent memory. It’s obvious we have less in common with each other, we chose to interact online rather than face to face, we even work from home when given the chance. Gone are the local pubs and corner shops.
The question we need to ask ourselves is: Is this a sustainable way to live?
Today there are several genders and sexual orientations. We have a far greater mix of ethnicities, religions and cultures living in the same cities. I will note Australia has a growing wealth gap and vastly polarising political and economic views. When I was a teenager it was common to hear young adults openly supporting socialist ideals. Today we have elected officials outwardly describing themselves as ‘democratic’ socialists. If I could wish for anything, I’d wish that schools still taught ‘warts and all’ history, and that people performed their own research. Everyone needs to read further and wider, instead placating their bias on favourite legacy media outlets or equally biased social media personalities. You will never escape your chosen bubble until you change your information sources.
"Where'd you get your information from, huh? You think that you can front when revelation comes?” The Beastie Boys
One of the reasons humans become more socio-politically polar as they age, is because of the opportunity that more life experience gives you to acquire knowledge or dig yourself deeper into a hole.
History was never a subject of interest to me unless it was connected to the antiquity of valuable item. I was as progressive as they come, I had to hold a day job for many years to fund my love of digital creativity. There were no jobs or university courses developed at the time for anything I was interested in. It wasn’t until I become a father that I became interested in history, and only then as a precursor to politics, finance and economics. To understand anything really, you need to understand history.
“History Doesn't Repeat Itself, but It Often Rhymes” – Mark Twain.
Nobody wants to be stupid. The only way to ensure against stupidity is to be well informed. You won’t be unless you make yourself uncomfortable. You need to learn new difficult things and look for answers in different places. It’s not easy. Human brains process information in patterns. These patterns help us make decisions quickly and efficiently. But these shortcuts, known as heuristics and biases, frequently make us repeat our errors.
The great thing about history is it’s happened already. There is the adage ‘History is written by the Victors’ but historical scholarship will quickly dispatch that theory. Furthermore it doesn’t account for physical evidence or witnesses.
To complicate things, people can find offence with those that are too similar to them. There are studies and theories about interpersonal behaviours that suggest need-compatibility in attraction, where people prefer not to work with others who are too similar. And let’s not forget the ‘argumentative personality type’. (Karens) I’ve already written about National Identity. I would like you to know I found it extremely difficult to write about, I made no conclusions. There is a link at the bottom of this page.
I was never a person who felt nominally proud of being Australian, I never identified with the those who proudly flew the Australian flag especially those who had it tattooed on their bodies. In my old age I have softened my views on nationalism and religion.
Regardless of how I feel about either subject, I recognise their need to maintain a harmonious society. This assumes you believe that common values themselves have value, I think a lot of people in the leftie bubble don’t. They find the very mention of this and many other subjects a trigger for racism.
Religion, was it a glue?
Although raised Catholic, I am not sure I ever accepted the existence of God. I understand the importance of faith (suspension of disbelief). But I sat in church thinking about almost anything else. I’ve always preferred science-fiction that has a basis in actual science and a believable storyline. Jesus almost certainly existed, but I see him as a brilliant politician, certainly full of great ideas, great ideas that we built western democracies upon.
There were key benefits that Christianity offered, the value of secularism, it’s specific ethics and moral values. Other religions have certainly possessed latter in some form, but without the vastly centralised nature of the Christian church, they have been unable to keep them in context. It too easy for radicals to spin off into another cult or sect. This is what is happening with Islam. There is no one to slap a jihadist Imams and tell them to pull their heads in.
But still today I can’t advocate religion… Although I understand most people are too weak minded to find and adhere to common ethics, values and morals without a brand label. Religion can’t save us because of the fundamentally different values the many brands sermonise. Meanwhile the atheists are busy creating new religions, typically based on even more abstract reason for division such as Climate Change, Black Lives Matter and Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. What hope do we have?
War.
The gist of war as a unifying agent is: War often makes people more willing to help their own group, although it generally increases distrust toward outsiders. How then people classify themselves and others, becomes key. If the grouping is not aligned with the conflict (typically regional) is there cohesion? I think that in most western democracies, that have undergone heavy immigration recently, it would not be foolish to assume this might be impossible. A global conflict in the late 2020’s is certainly going to involve China, Russia and North Korea. The far wings of any western democracy would almost certainly oppose any conflict they did not initiate. There will be previous citizens of these enemy states, that would be conflicted out. We would not be able to intern these people as we did during the previous world wars. The Oct 7 attacks on Isreal did not unify the country. You could use Ukraine as an example except it’s not nearly as ethnically diverse.
Australia in a global conflict is going to be tense, very tense.
China, given Xi Jinping is a man of his word, will invade Tiawan in 2027. If you understand the various historical and current treaties Australia and its allies are a part of, you will know it will trigger a global conflict automatically. Your specific pollical views aside, Australia will be involved, that’s already been decided. From that moment on we will be at war with China and the PLAN (Chinese Navy) will easily blockade the flow of trade to Australia, the most significant of which being fuel Currently we only have 20 days’ supply of diesel, the fuel used in all transport and food growing machinery. And there’s losing the most significant trade partner. We will be in a dire situation within months.
So forgive me for seeing no opportunity for unity on the horizon. I remember the fights in the supermarkets and the road rage during the Covid shortages. It’s important to remember we’re not a bunch of friends. We’re just co-existing on the same land.
Communism vs socialism
How to learn from mistakes.
Biases explained.
List of common fallacies
National Identity
Effects of War on society